In the short story “The Birthmark,” Nathaniel Hawthorne recounts a tale of a man who becomes so obsessed with a birthmark on his wife’s cheek that he completely disregards everything else about her, objectifying her to the point where he treats her like an experiment rather than someone he actually cares about. Aylmer’s neurotic captivation with Georgiana’s birthmark and his unreasonable desire to perfect his wife leads to her crippling self-loathing and ultimately her demise. Hawthorne not only exposes the destruction that a relationship such as theirs causes but cautions against the idea of complete obedience and devotion from a wife to her husband. At first, Georgiana is a confident person, assured in her own beauty and unique allure. When …show more content…
One night Georgiana overhears a dream he has in which he tries to remove her birthmark but ends up having to cut out her heart. Upset, she confronts him, and he admits to the dream, informing her in more depth about his abhorrence of the blemish on her cheek. By this point, Georgiana’s self-esteem is practically nonexistent and she has grown tired of her husband’s constant repulsed looks. Indeed, she now refers to the birthmark as “terrible” and tries to hide it from her husband’s view when he looks at her. In light of his dream, she tells him “Danger is nothing to me; for life, while this hateful mark makes me the object of your horror and disgust—life is a burden which I will fling down with joy” (Hawthorne 140). Aylmer’s relentless preoccupation with her birthmark has affected her so deeply that she would rather die than be on the receiving end of his revulsion any …show more content…
He reprimands her for entering his lab without warning and accuses her of not trusting him, to which Georgiana replies that it is he who does not trust her. She lets on that she knows very well that the procedure may not be successful but insists that he go on with it anyways. Aylmer’s treatment of his wife as an object that has to be fixed to fit his idea of a perfect woman has proved to be so detrimental to her self-worth that she willingly risks her own death to make him happy. Aylmer, on the contrary, cares little for the happiness of Georgiana. He is so engrossed in experimenting and removing her birthmark that he does not talk to her unless it is about the procedure or his own achievements, and he can barely stand to look at her. While Georgiana does everything in her power to make sure her husband is content, Aylmer thinks only of
Aylmer’s desire to make his wife perfect is doomed to failure because perfection, Hawthorne suggests, is the exclusive province of heaven that cannot be found on earth. Because she becomes an ideal being, completely unmarried, Georgiana is no longer able to exist in this world. The birthmark has references to life, death, nature, beauty, insecurities and disgust.
The attempted removal of Georgiana’s birthmark by Aylmer signifies a desire to conquer nature and reveals a hidden quality within Aylmer. The first instance in which the reader sees Aylmer trying to conquer or control nature is subtle, it is near the beginning of the story and the narrator says “[Aylmer] persuaded a beautiful woman to become his wife” (211). The common belief is that love occurs naturally and cannot be forced. It seems as though the narrator chooses to state that Aylmer persuaded his wife, rather than fell in love with her, in order to indicate early on in the text Aylmer’s tendencies toward manipulating nature. Later in the
Uttering heartless words to a partner about their flaws is a reflection of one’s insecurity in the relationship. The short story “The Birthmark” gives readers insight into Aylmer, a questionable scientist who fails at experiments, and his wife Georgiana, an obedient wife who fulfills her husband’s commands. Aylmer is insecure and as a result denigrates Georgiana about her birthmark to purposefully make her despise the mark. Georgiana never thought of her birthmark as a flaw because men were enchanted by her fairy-like miniature hand with a shade of crimson. However, Georgiana being the good wife that she is, agrees to become her husband’s experiment to get the birthmark removed in order to make Aylmer happy. In this story it is evident that
In the short story The Birth-mark, Aylmer: scientist, philosopher and perfectionist, is married to Georgiana, a woman of unthinkable beauty and possibly the closest woman to ever reach perfection. However, the tiny hand shaped mark that lay on the surface of her cheek aggravates Aylmer and he thinks day and night of how he may get rid of it in order to help Georgiana reach the perfection that he longs for. The actions that he proceeds to take, prove that he is indeed the villain and the one to blame for Georgiana’s death. He does so by tearing her down with crude words, making Georgiana feel insecure and self-conscious about her outward appearance as well as keeping his failed experiments a secret to her.
Torvald and Alymer think they’re inlove with their wives but, they are not. Alymer and Torvald love their possessions, similar to loving a car. They love the feeling and the moments they get to spend on earth mesmerizing their beautiful uniqueness, but they do not care about the wellbeing of the other person. “Women define visibility as including communication, verbal and non-verbal, show the slipperiness of the slope, and raise question of consciousness.” (Deutsch, 1889) In both relationships there was a lack of communication, intimacy, and respect. Nora and Georgianna both wanted their loved ones to show concern for them even in rough circumstances, but both men failed either because of selfness or love of science. When Torvald received the IUE from Krogstat, his immediate response was “I’m saved!” Being selfish his first thoughts are of himself rather than, his kids, and Nora. Aylmer’s attention to his wife’s birthmark over time, drove Georgianna insane to the point where she would die trying to remove a little mark on her face. Alymer started to point out that she is no longer perfect because of the birthmark. After you marry someone you accept their flaws internally and externally, and both failed to do so therefore, they lost their wives.
According to Liz Rosenberg, throughout Hawthorne’s literary career, “[He praised] the imperfect and moral quality of human nature” (Rosenberg 1). The two motifs of morality and imperfection in “The Birthmark” direct the readers’ attention towards Hawthorne’s belief that instinctive actions represent human nature in a more genuine way than actions influenced by religious laws. In the short story, Georgiana’s blemish represents the actuality of human nature and not the false pretense of perfection that people thrive so hard to achieve. However, Georgiana herself represents the general population in society. Because Georgiana dies after the author portrays her as completely perfect, one can imply that perfection cannot be achieved and is only an idea fabricated by society’s leaders or governmental bodies.
The scene in question opens with Georgiana asking Aylmer to recall if he had dreamt of the birthmark. Georgiana’s high self-consciousness and shame felt from Aylmer’s horrified stares motivates her to confront Aylmer. At first, Aylmer denies the suggestion but then decides to admit he had dreamt of it. Before Aylmer can reveal his nightmare, Georgiana expresses a desire to rid herself of the mark. In doing this, Georgiana describes the birthmark using negative terms such as “fatal birthmark” and “stain.” Prior to her request, Georgiana had described the birthmark as “a charm.” This shift in perspective is key to both the plot of the story and its implications for
Yet, Georgiana has a quality about her that her husband Aylmer can hardly stand. Despite her lovely pale face, a tiny
...ection. By removing the birthmark from Georgiana’s face, Aylmer has taken away her humanity thus leading Georgiana to her death. Georgiana cannot live anymore because she is no longer a human being. Therefore claiming that science has its limits over nature and if those limits are crossed the consequences could be fatal.
One of the main themes discussed in this story is perfection which was evident by Aylmer obsessing over making his wife perfect by removing the birthmark off
The story’s tone is one of romantic controversy, a dilemma at a high level of existence. The scientist’s love for his craft competes very intensively with his newfound love for his wife. It is also very psychological, strictly dealing with the raw mind of its subjects as if the ominous narrator told the story from inside their mind, rather than observe it from the outside. He describes the processes that one may take to reach a certain degree of knowledge and to find the elixir of life, which is described in this story as the ultimate goal of the scientific community. Also, the narrator is very opinionated about events in the story.
She is the wife of a science-obsessed man, she is alone and placed second to his first love. That alone is a dangerous situation. I believe that she might be internally fighting for first place once she realizes that the only thing that will please him is removing the birthmark from her cheek. She is almost immediately aware of the potential consequence of removing the birthmark, “"Aylmer," resumed Georgiana, solemnly, "I know not what may be the cost to both of us to rid me of this fatal birthmark. Perhaps its removal may cause cureless deformity; or it may be the stain goes as deep as life itself.”” (Hawthorne 215). Aylmer tries to reassure her that he has thought this through many times and that nothing bad would happen. I am not sure if she quite trusts him as much as she wants to please him and hear him stop speaking of her birthmark in such a negative way. Georgiana becomes repulsed of herself due to her husband 's incessant need to perfect what has no fatal
After a deeper analysis of the characters in the story “The Birthmark” it is easy to see there are multiple hidden meanings throughout. The characteristics and actions of Aylmer, Georgiana, Amenidab and Nature help us to see deeper into the characters and see their true motivations and meanings in the story.
The tone adopted by Hawthorne from the inception of the narrative toward Aylmer urges the reader to respect Aylmer’s scientific ambition—directly his triumph of head over heart, but indirectly his objectification of Georgiana and subsequent attempts to fix something that she never thought was a flaw. Not only is Aylmer’s obsession with getting rid of her birthmark selfish in that he does it for “the sake of giving himself peace” (647) rather than any desire to make his wife happy, he also admits to feeling guilt over his tyrannical treatment of her. For example, his “horror and disgust” in response to her facial blight rarely escapes her notice, and when she reacts poorly to his “convulsive shudder,” he attempts to soothe her and “release her mind from the burden of actual things” (650) as if she is an empty-headed infant in need of a pacifier. Furthermore, in response to her desperate request for its removal, he isolates her from humanity, administers potentially harmful concoctions into her rooms and body without her knowledge, and ultimately—and rapturously—succeeds in shrinking the mark at the cost of her
Every man before has always complimented Georgiana on her sweet imperfection. People would tell her all the time that true beauty was in that little blemish. Aylmer, being the man of Science wanted to change what nature had created. Typically, we all know better than to go against Nature, but not Aylmer. Georgiana finally agreed to let her husband remove the birthmark due to a frightening dream Aylmer had encountered. Aylmer started working on a potion to remove Georgiana 's birthmark. As soon as Georgiana sipped the potion, she suddenly falls into a deep coma-like state. The birthmark magically disappears from Georgina 's face. However, as the birthmark fades away, so does Georgina 's life. Hawthorne uses Georgiana 's character to symbolize beauty in this story. Georgiana is already made perfect in the eyes of Nature and all other men, expect Aylmer. Aylmer, representing Science, tries to change Georgiana 's beauty that Nature has created. Aylmer was successful in removing the birthmark, but unsuccessful in keeping Georgiana alive. Aylmer was too intertwined in Science to realize that Georgiana was perfectly made by Nature. Nature paid Aylmer back for trying to correct Georgiana 's face by taking the life of his beloved